Bloomberg reports: Delinquency rates on the least risky mortgages more than doubled in the first quarter from a year earlier as U.S. efforts to help homeowners failed to keep pace with job losses that pushed more borrowers toward foreclosure. Prime mortgages 60 days or more past due climbed to…
According to the updated statistics by the United States Department of Labor , the number of unemployed persons increased by 787,000 to 14.5 million in May, raising the unemployment rate to 9.4 percent. While the Obama Making Home Affordable Modification Plan was designed around a subprime mortgage crisis model…
The Wall Street Journal reports Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner’s plan to help investors buy troubled assets from banks has lost momentum. Big banks worried about having to sell at fire-sale prices while small banks feared they would be shut out. Potential buyers balked at the risk of doing business…
Investors announced bids within seconds of each other on some steeply discounted foreclosures auctioned on Friday in front of the Santa Ana Courthouse. I attended the trustee’s sale to gauge investor interest these days and to see if the state’s foreclosure moratorium, which began earlier this month, is having…
Randy Johnson, president of Independence Mortgage Co. in Newport Beach, author of “How to Save Thousands of Dollars on Your Home Mortgage” and a mortgage broker since 1983, answers questions… Q. My home in Orange County has a value of about $800,000. My remaining mortgage is less than $100,000.…
Bloomberg reports: The Federal Reserve will let one of its emergency programs expire and trim two others in a sign that improving financial markets allow a first step toward ending its unprecedented interventions. The three programs provide funds or Treasury securities to securities brokers and money-market funds. They are…
The government’s role in the housing market continues to expand. Here’s the latest from National Mortgage News: The Federal Housing Administration insured $27.3 billion in single-family mortgages in April — up 8% from the previous month due to higher mortgage purchase volume. Mortgage purchase volume rose $1.6 billion to…
What are Mortgage Backed Securities, and why do I need to learn all of these complicated terms just to get a loan modification? Before the foreclosure / credit crisis , homeowners never had to concern themselves with complicated mortgage fundamentals such as mortgage backed securities, credit default swaps ,…
The Mortgage Bankers Association today said its index of mortgage application volume rose 6% last week vs. two weeks ago and 17.2% vs. the same period a year ago. On a week-to-week basis the refinance index rose 5.9% and the purchase index jumped 7.3%.
Read more here – Mortgage…
Bank of America, Citigroup and EMC Mortgage Corp. are among seven companies that have received permanent exemptions to California’s 90-day foreclosure moratorium, which began last week. More than 20 other lenders and loan servicers, including Wells Fargo and JPMorgan Chase, have received a temporary exemption while they wait to…